Apple hires Yves Saint Laurent’s CEO Paul Deneve

Apple hired Paul Deneve, the 53-year-old CEO of fashion house Yves Saint Laurent. Deneve is also a former Apple employee, who have worked as a sales and marketing manager at Apple Europe from 1990 to 1997.

In a comment sent to AllThingsD, Apple spokeswoman said: “We’re thrilled to welcome Paul Deneve to Apple. He’ll be working on special projects as a vice president reporting directly to Tim Cook.”

So what could a fashion company’s CEO bring to Apple? We tend to think it has something to do with the rumored iWatch. The Cupertino-based company will need all the help it can get to convince people their existing watches aren’t fit for the 21st century. This is especially tough if we’re talking about the owners of expensive watches like those made by companies such as Patek Philippe, Rolex and IWC.

Apple always positioned itself as much more than computer company with its products often having a status symbol. Will Deneve be able to help Apple break the fashion barriers, again? We’ll have to wait and see…